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Book Review
Coming to terms with identity
Susan Visvanathan
NEGOTIATING BORDERS— Theological Explorations in the Global Era (Essays in Honour of Prof. Felix Wilfred): Edited by Patrick Gnanapragasam and Elisabeth Schussler Fiorenza; ISPCK, PB No. 1585, Madarsa Road, Kashmere Gate, Delhi-110016. Rs. 650.
In this collection of essays written by some very famous theologians some are very interesting giving the reader a good sense of how fine the craft of scholarship and spirituality (webbing delicately, like a dream catcher) in narrative is. Roland Barthes in the “Rustle of Language” argues that science, literature, and the pursuit of pleasure, in ideas, is the wealth of nations, and indeed the monasteries and the universities have always made this their vocation. Social science and theology, when dealing with spirituality may be classified in the vocabulary of pleasure, where it combines truth and invention in startling ways.
Why do we invent? It is the mother of necessity. I can still remember my elder sister whose name is Esther, terrifying me during a lunch break in school when we met by chance at the swings, asking me, “Susan, how do you know we are not in hell? How do you know this is not hell?” It still terrifies me, that moment, because I was five years old, and she was eight, and the school bell was about to ring any moment. Basically, she was asking me, “How do you know you are not dead?” In this collection, faith and belief are taken for granted, but also questioned and celebrated. To none of these writers is God a stranger. Such a sociology of religion presupposes that a text is constructed from the heart of faith, and will affirm life giving practices as opposed to life taking or deceiving ones. To believe, one must first question.
Identity negotiation
The editors argue that “identity negotiation” is the most important part of the problem at hand. Multiple identities are in focus. They write, “Gender, race, ethnic, cultural, economic, married single, homosexual or heterosexual are some of the visible identities around which an individual navigates the life-boat. While some of these are ascriptive, in the sense that they are almost imposed upon an individual, others are achieved.”
However, the subtext of this collection is the papal directive to be “in unity of spirit,” where Pope John Paul II and the Pontifical Council for Dialogue asserted that the relationship between Christianity and other cultures and religion, always had to be in the togetherness, of understanding their responsibilities as humans, and to planet Earth. When a pope said that the God of Christians and God of Muslims were different, he was immediately visited by some Muslim clergy who said that they heard what he said, and there was evidence of this argument in their literature! Involved in such interactions, the pope had to move to a more listening and respecting stance vis-À-vis Muslim faith. When, in 1987, Cardinal Michael Fitzgerald came as a delegate to the World Council of Churches conference he was representing a theological dictum in the Vatican, which was to shift away from the idea that Catholics are the only representatives of the Christian faith. When the journal Vidya Jyothi published an essay on the question of the fallibility of the pope some decades ago, there was quite an uproar. Theological positions therefore are historical ones, which are documented with transparency.
Globalisation
The paper which looks at AIDS and globalisation in this collection, offers a perspective which asserts the right to sexuality as a human right, and that again, only by listening to the dissonance, can there be a dialogue on what it means to be human.
It is not easy to pose these questions, leave alone answer them. Ariarajah, makes the point in this book, that globalisation and livelihood are related; that migration must be understood as the impetus of modernism; where value judgments regarding choice of life world, will mitigate the possibility of survival, and so argues on behalf of multiple religious belongings. I understand that position well, since my autobiography has allowed me to live out the Hindu-Christian since early childhood. Further for the ancient Christian community in which I was born, that anvil has been present since the first century according to oral traditions. Ariarajah once said to me, (when he was boss of the dialogue subunit in 1987, and I was a consultant to the World Council of Churches, Geneva) “Only the Christians are truly pantheistic, since they believe in the existence of millions of gods who are antagonistic to their faith!” It takes time to unravel that one, but this book is packed with many such enjoyable mysteries. Another Sri Lankan theologian, who also writes in this book is exercised by the fact that wine drinking is not acceptable to many new converts, often from Buddhism, and has said that they should take the example of the St. Thomas Christians who use grape juice instead of wine in their Eucharist service. My fieldwork data in 1980 referred to oral evidence that they indeed in the early 20th century used juice of raisins! (“Evdae addi, mundri?”) When it comes to symbols, any teacher of comparative religion knows that from the time of Abelard at least, the questions remain unanswered, for faith is the privilege of those who believe. But it is our moral right to ask, at least!
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